Dining with the "enemy"

Friday night Charlie, Karen and I were invited to dinner by Khaled Yusuf who is a jute mill owner, and a member of a very well-connected family. He can only be described as the upper-upper crust. (He family literally was the landed gentry, how many people can you say that about).

He and his wife Afroza were quite possibly the most hospitable people I have ever met. They made us feel so welcome and served us an assortment of traditional Bengali dishes. I finally understand what people mean when they talk about Bangladeshi hospitality.

At one point Afroze's brother stopped by. He happened to be a garment factory owner, so Mr. Yusuf introduced Charlie and I as "the enemy". He was kidding, but the brother decided he should fill us in on the owner's perspective of things. Listening to him made me feel that I had done my homework as there was not one thing he said that I hadn't heard before. Some was, in my opinion, slightly far-fetched. He said any increase in the minimum wage was going to put nearly half of the garment factories out of business. From everything I've read that simply can't be the case. He also hinted very strongly at a conspiracy of some sorts leading to worker unrest, a theory that even industry sources view as ridiculous. He also said that every single worker at his factory is happy, and at least 9 out of 10 factories are completely compliant with every law. None of this sounded realistic.

Overall the night was great, even the conversation with the "enemy".

Later in the week they invited us (including J.R. too) to the Dhaka Club for dinner to celebrate Charlie's last night. This meant they had to take 2 separate cars to pick us up and take us across the city. The Dhaka Club is the most elite institution in the city, It was originally founded by the British colonialists but gradually has been overtaken by the Bangladeshi upper crust. Brandt describes it by saying that when you are taken there "you know you've arrived." This isn't exactly true, but was definitely a nice send off for Charlie.